A study published in PLoS One and Chemistry: Exploration, Environment, Analysis found that termite mounds in West Australian goldfields contained high concentrations of gold. This means that the insects can be used to help humans find gold and other mineral deposits.

Aaron Stewart, an entomologist from the Commonwealth Scientific and Industrial Research Organisation (CSIRO), said: "We're using insects to help find new gold and other mineral deposits. These resources are becoming increasingly hard to find because much of the Australian landscape is covered by a layer of eroded material that masks what's going on deeper underground."

Termites and ants burrow down deep into the material which retains a "fingerprint" of the underlying gold deposits. They then bring traces of this fingerprint to the surface and stockpile it in their mounds. In order to identify the metal accumulation in the termites, Stewart and his team use X-rays and electron microscopy. They found that they accumulated zinc, magnesium, iron and gold.

The team discovered that small ant and termite mounds are just as valuable in finding gold as mounds that are several metres tall.

They believe that insects could provide a new, cost effective way of finding new mineral deposits in Australia. Minerals represent a major export for the country, and after many decades of mining, many of the surface deposits have already been depleted. Miners need new tools to explore deeper underground.

The team found that metals also accumulate in the excretory systems of termites. The termites then actively rid their bodies of excess metals by excreting little stones, much like kidney stones in people. According to Stewart, these excretions are "a driving force in redistribution of metals near the surface".

36 Reader Comments

I predict in several decades scientist would be able to create GM termites or ants which has a pathological attraction to gold, precious metals, gems and diamonds. Driven under their artificial programmed 'needs' by their human overlord, work meticulously and diligently to mine for some half of the human overlords equally attracted to everything shiny.

The question to exploiting this is really figuring out whether the cost of encouraging termite mounds in an alluvial area is offset by the amount of material you can get out of the mounds once they're 'matured'. It sounds promising, but it might not pan out in the long term.

Interesting. Way back when (1968) Larry Niven's novel "A Gift From Earth" hypothesized genetically engineered earthworms, that burrowed through mineral deposits and excreted what was indigestible at the surface. Next step...

The question to exploiting this is really figuring out whether the cost of encouraging termite mounds in an alluvial area is offset by the amount of material you can get out of the mounds once they're 'matured'. It sounds promising, but it might not pan out in the long term.

They're not taking the material from the termite mounds as the output. They're using its presence in the mounds as an indicator of promising deposits nearby.

Interesting. Way back when (1968) Larry Niven's novel "A Gift From Earth" hypothesized genetically engineered earthworms, that burrowed through mineral deposits and excreted what was indigestible at the surface. Next step...

And Dean Koontz's The Bad Place featured one brief alien setting with bugs that were designed to harvest red diamonds from soil on another world.

The question to exploiting this is really figuring out whether the cost of encouraging termite mounds in an alluvial area is offset by the amount of material you can get out of the mounds once they're 'matured'. It sounds promising, but it might not pan out in the long term.

They're not taking the material from the termite mounds as the output. They're using its presence in the mounds as an indicator of promising deposits nearby.

True that that is the current state of things, but setting up colonies as scouting or exploration tools would be the logical next step, followed by folks (along the lines of copper thieves) going out and digging up colonies to process the dirt for precious metals, and finishing up by using modified or selected species to do the mining itself.

Back when I took my geochemistry course in 1978, we were taught how certain species of trees had affinities for certain ores and their presence/distribution could be used to supplement other indicators. That this extends to insects does not surprise me.

At least they find their way back to the metals and home (I'm looking at you Apple!). Have their own nature made beacon to find stuff and now we'll find more stuff because of them. Now if we could use those termites in say emergency services, then they would be useful.

There are some Bacteria like "Cupriavidus metallidurans" (http://www.pnas.org/content/106/42/17757) which sequester Metals in small grains so i wonder if the Termite itself does the excretion or if it is a symbiotic Bacteria in its guts.

My name is King Bruce and I'm is an Australian Prince-minister of the outback the town city of Bugga-bugga in Austria. Yuo will may have herd news on the HTML wwww news recently that we have discover many gold in termite exclamation. Its all on the CCN and BBCC news is for reals mate. Even the Fox news so it must be true. I'm writing too yuo with an anazing in vest oportunaty.

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Australia's CSIRO - this is the same org that made headlines on ARS months back for patenting WiFi and obtaining millions worth of settlements with companies worldwide. Cynic in me begins to wonder if this is patentable.....

Australia's CSIRO - this is the same org that made headlines on ARS months back for patenting WiFi and obtaining millions worth of settlements with companies worldwide. Cynic in me begins to wonder if this is patentable.....

I think CSIRO had a legitimate claim in the wireless case. They're not a patent troll; they did the research initially and spun off a separate company to make the product under license from CSIRO, which was later bought by Cisco. The original research itself was publicly funded and CSIRO hoped to recoup some of the costs to taxpayers by licensing their technology under FRAND terms, since it was being worked into the 802.11a standard. Unfortunately for them, companies started making products based on the standard and incorporating their technology without bothering to buy a license at all. They had a legit patent, they were going about licensing fairly, and they were right that other companies were using their patented tech without seeking a license. The original charge of patent trolling was completely misplaced and unfair.

With that out of the way, CSIRO is like Australia's version of the National Science Foundation except they're not just a funding body, but actually carry out research themselves. They study everything from chemistry to the climate and churn out tons of peer-reviewed research.

Interesting. Way back when (1968) Larry Niven's novel "A Gift From Earth" hypothesized genetically engineered earthworms, that burrowed through mineral deposits and excreted what was indigestible at the surface. Next step...

And Dean Koontz's The Bad Place featured one brief alien setting with bugs that were designed to harvest red diamonds from soil on another world.

Let's not forget the formic hybrids in Orson Scott Card's book Ender in Exile. They were engineered to mine various types of ores.

This is not quite as true as you might think. Whist the superpit certainly gains more recognition than other gold mines in Australia, it is only useful due to the high surface gold concentrations in the Kalgoorlie-Boulder area. As per the article, the gold concentrations for the majority of more modern mines are situated well below ground and as such are more efficiently reached with tunnels(in terms of scale, think 3 haulpacks side by side) rather than open pits.

There are huge swathes of central Australia which are absolutely covered in termite mines, suggesting that the mineral boom here could be several orders of magnitude larger what was previously believed, but most it is native title land (large amounts of land, especially in the Northern Territory, have been placed in the custody of the remnants of Aboriginal tribes from the respective areas, in an attempt to atone for their poor treatment in the past), which will cause political difficulties when currently mined deposits start to get low.

This is not quite as true as you might think. Whist the superpit certainly gains more recognition than other gold mines in Australia, it is only useful due to the high surface gold concentrations in the Kalgoorlie-Boulder area. As per the article, the gold concentrations for the majority of more modern mines are situated well below ground and as such are more efficiently reached with tunnels(in terms of scale, think 3 haulpacks side by side) rather than open pits.

There are huge swathes of central Australia which are absolutely covered in termite mines, suggesting that the mineral boom here could be several orders of magnitude larger what was previously believed, but most it is native title land (large amounts of land, especially in the Northern Territory, have been placed in the custody of the remnants of Aboriginal tribes from the respective areas, in an attempt to atone for their poor treatment in the past), which will cause political difficulties when currently mined deposits start to get low.

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Or maybe it will be like American Indians who will lease or otherwise set up their own enterprises to exploit their resources.